Top Rank Boxing on ESPN Saturday night draws 728,000 viewers

Top Rank Boxing on ESPN Saturday night drew 728,000 according to Nielsen. The event featured Vasyl Lomachenko as he handily took care of Miguel Marriaga.

There was an overlap with the NFL Hall of Fame ceremonies which may have skewed the ratings. Still, the main event went up against UFC Fight Night’s main event of Pettis-Moreno.

The ratings are less than Top Rank’s debut last month with Manny Pacquiao-Jeff Horn. The event drew 3.1 million viewers and peaked with 4.4 million viewers. Saturday night’s event was much less than that.

One has to think this is a disappointing rating for Top Rank as the UFC, with a weaker card, outdrew the debut of Lomachenko on cable TV. It’s hard to explain why UFC Fight Night did better than someone that is considered one of boxing’s best at this time. Perhaps the run-up for Mayweather-McGregor or combat sports fans are conditioned to watch UFC Saturdays, but boxing did not draw Saturday night.

Yeah, this is horrific for Top Rank. They figured with the big number they put up with Pacquaio(despite the fact that they likely lost money on that fight), they’d continue with Lomachenko and most of their big names, but as we see here it is not the case. This venture is as doomed as PBC was and what’s worse for Arum is he no longer has a ppv star.

No surprises that FF is attempting to spin that box office poison.

Jess on
August 8th, 2017 6:48 PM

I think it did well considering all that went wrong with the broadcast. Slightly better than the UFC card in the younger demo too. Good night of fights for both.

szabo finney on
August 9th, 2017 8:56 AM

The UFC outdrew Top Rank but still got a lower rating. Top Rank boxing was the highest rated sports program on cable or broadcast for Saturday. They didn’t do as well as expected because the NFL hall of fame pushed them very late into the night and probably caused many people to switch to the UFC and other programming but it is not the catastrophic disappointment that some people are suggesting it was.

Caramel City on
August 9th, 2017 12:04 PM

Decent for constantly changing the channels

C on
August 9th, 2017 12:55 PM

I’m just here reading the spin master’s (d) comments. Hopefully he gives us good info from the Top Rank and ESPN boardroom meetings he regularly attends.

Here are the facts, a pair of minor league headliners on the lowest profile headliner of the year for the UFC outdrew one of boxing’s biggest stars on ESPN which is a bigger audience than FS1. That’s a humiliating moment for Top Rank and boxing on ESPN as a whole.

Fight Fan on
August 9th, 2017 7:04 PM

Show wasn’t on ESPN for the first hour and a half, keep spinning d, you’re off as always. That 4 billion is too much for you to handle.